Accelerator boards - no future? Bad business?

[Noel Chiappa]

    > From: Jules Richardson

    > I think my personal view is that I'll consider modern replacements to
    > things when it's impossible to use the originals - but not simply for
    > reasons of speed, cost, convenience.

This sounds like it's not _that_ far from my position, which is that I am
against building modern equivalents for "stuff that is still available and
perfectly functional".

    >> running the disks ... risks damaging what are effectively museum
    >> pieces.

    > There I'd just say run them until they break and can't be fixed, and
    > then they can become static museum exhibits. 

The problem with that is that I feel that it conflicts with what I feel one of
our main goals ought to be, which is to preserve these machines in running
form, for history and the education of future generations.

Yes, even powering them on risks a failure, but most failures are repairable.
A crashed head, if you don't have spares, is pretty much un-fixable (there's a
whole manufacturing complex needed to create them, which is now gone, and one
can't substitute an alternative part). So I'd run them as little as possible -
and a modern solid-state alternative really helps with that.

(BTW, there's a big debate in the museum world over this sort of topic: some
places won't do any cleaning and fixing of antique objects, retaining them
exactly as they were, and living with the degradation of plastics, etc;
others do restoration, but mark what was done, and make it reversible if
possible; others go all out and restore things to 'like new'. I'm kind of in
camp II, myself.)

There's also a practical down-side to the 'run it as a matter of course till
it fails forever' approach; if one has packs for that drive which one wishes
to read or write, that's no longer possible once the drive is roached
(although someone else could do it for you, but that's not necessarily a
desirable option).

And of course, with the drive dead, the machine may not be runnable unless one
adds a modern alternative - and if one's willing to do that _after_ the drive
is fried, why not before?


    > From: Swift Griggs

    > I might be laughed at for wanting a Fiero-Ferrari

For a good time, Google 'Jerrari'! :-)

	Noel